Faceoff: 7:30 p.m., Verizon Center
TV: CSN, NBCSN | Radio: 1500 AM
Bruins lead series, 2-1
Postgame links:
— Bruins beat Caps, 4-3, to take 2-1 series lead
— Backstrom receives match penalty for cross creck
— Wise: Offense arrives, but Caps don’t have enough
— Caps fans taunt Thomas with Obama signs
— Interactive graphic: Shot tracker
Update: Backstrom was assessed a match penalty at the end of the game for his cross check on Peverley, which comes with an automatic one-game suspension pending review by the NHL. More here.
End of regulation: Bruins win, 3-2 4-3. Holtby with 25 stops. Boston now leads the series, two games to one. Gotta run but we’ll have much more to come soon, so stay tuned.
18:07 3rd: Chara’s shot goes in off Hamrlik’s stick during 4-on-4. Caps still get a 48-second power play coming up.
17:34 3rd: Another scrum ends with Alzner making a “stop crying” gesture at Lucic. I think he mouthed, “Mommy,” too. Lucic and Hendricks are off for roughing.
16:46 3rd: Very bad timing for Nicklas Backstrom to get called for cross-checking. Now Bruins get a late chance on the power play.
14:00 3rd: Brooks Laich gets one past Thomas on a breakaway to tie it up at 3.
Neil, 11:17 3rd: Mostly Bruins so far in the first half of the third, scoring chances 4-1 in Boston’s favor, including the go-ahead goal.
11:17 3rd: Seidenberg off for roughing for a hit on Backstrom and the Caps get a good chance here to even it up.
3:01 3rd: Chimera slashes Marchand right in the...somewhere that, um, would seemingly hurt a lot. Caps to the PK a goal down.
1:02 3rd: After a big scramble around the crease, Rolston cashes in on a rebound to give Boston the lead, 3-2.
Neil, end of 2nd: Chances were Caps 4, Bruins 3 in the second, making it 9-8 Washington overall. Ovechkin (3) and Semin (2) lead the team. Beagle has the best chance of the night: a 20ft wrister that Thomas stopped cold.
18:39 2nd: Something about Jay Beagle makes Tim Thomas elevate his play...or Tim Thomas is just really good. Beagle’s now had two great chances in this series and Thomas has robbed him blind twice.
13:19 2nd: Lucic and Laich get matching minors after Lucic takes Laich down — and Laich perhaps embellishes it a little — off the faceoff. 4-on-4.
9:38 2nd: Daniel Paille knocks in a rebound, and this game is tied again.
6:11 2nd: Pouliot had a great chance from point blank and Holtby made the save. So I guess he’s not too rattled from the rather soft goal he gave up at the start of this period.
Lindsay, 0:48 2nd: Well, I was typing that this game was tied up after Peverley shot it right past Holtby’s glove on a 4-on-4, but then 13 seconds later, Ovechkin scored his first goal of the playoffs, beating Thomas from an angle. 2-1 Caps. So to recap, that’s three goals — two more than these teams scored in 62 minutes of Game 1.
Neil, end of 1st: Chances even at 5 apiece. Semin leads team with 2.
Lindsay, end of 1st: They just added a second on the clock for an icing call, and that’s all that was needed for a nice little scrum. Lucic grabs Backstrom’s helmet and rips it off.
Tarik, end of 1st: After Game 1 the Caps talked a lot about needing to generate traffic and disrupt Thomas’s vision. Semin’s first-period goal was a perfect example of how to do just that. Laich stood in front of the net and obscured Thomas’s vision. Never saw the puck.
16:00 1st: So embarrassing that in a mental lapse, Semin fires a shot and beats Tim Thomas five hole on the power play. That’s not what this series is about. Caps 1, Bruins 0.
Lindsay, 12:17 1st: Adventures With Braden Holtby, Part II: Laich misses the net, Lucic brings it back on a 2-on-1 and Holtby stones him with a glove save. Crowd here is chanting, “Holt-BY, Holt-BY!”
Lindsay, 9:45 1st: Adventures With Braden Holtby: He loses his stick as he goes after a loose puck, manages to not allow a goal.
Lindsay, 3:26 1st: Semin goes to the box for a trip but the Caps kill it off — without much effort needed, as Boston only got one shot off. Washington’s PK is now 7-for-7 in the playoffs. As for the power play in this series overall, that’s 0-for-12. I’m beginning to question its very existence.
Lindsay, 0:46 1st: Ovechkin just blew up Seidenberg with a monster hit right out the gate. He must have liked what he read in the “What’s Right With Alex Ovechkin” column.
Katie, 7:10 p.m.: So Coach Dale Hunter tinkered with the lineup for Game 3 and put Jason Chimera on the top line with Alex Ovechkin and Brooks Laich.
But in addition to that alteration, he reunited the shutdown “wolfpack” of Matt Hendricks, Jay Beagle and Troy Brouwer that worked well in the final month of the regular season. With home-ice advantage and the last change allowing him to match lines, it makes sense that Hunter would want more of a true shutdown option in this tilt than he had in Games 1 and 2.
Forwards
Ovechkin-Laich-Chimera
Johansson-Backstrom-Semin
Hendricks-Beagle-Brouwer
Aucoin-Perreault-Ward
Defense
Alzner-Carlson
Hamrlik-Green
Schultz-Wideman
Goal
Holtby
Sabourin
Lindsay, 7 p.m.: Hey, look who I ran into downstairs when I went to get some pregame coffee.
Lindsay, 5 p.m.: Greetings from Verizon Center, where Caps fans hope to further boost their team’s imposing home advantage by printing out pictures of the president’s face. We’ll be back once warmups start with lines and more. Until then, comments are open as usual.
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